Hilton Flores/Staten Island AdvanceThe South Shore National squad will be looking to stay alive in the Littlle League World Series on Monday night. Nick Pucciarelli, seen getting congratulations from manager Mike Zaccariello after an opening-game home run, will be back in the lineup.

SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. -- The Midwest's spectacular 5-3 comeback win over Northwest on Sunday made it official: South Shore National's game Monday night (8) will officially be a do-or-die situation.

Urbandale LL (Iowa) trailed 3-0 but scored five runs in the bottom of the fifth inning to set the stage for a win or go home battle with the Mid-Atlantic Champs from Tottenville.

After suffering a tough 6-3 loss to the Southeast (Warner Robins American, of Georgia, who will face the Northwest today) on Saturday, South Shore National manager Mike Zaccariello knows the situation: win or go home.

"This is basically an elimination game," the manager said, just after practice Sunday. "It's win and you're in. And a lot of teams are in the same situation."

South Shore National and Urbandale are both 1-1 after two games in pool play. Both have beaten the Northwest and lost to the Southeast.

With a win, South Shore National would be the second place team in Pool A, and take on Pool B's top seed Wednesday at 8 p.m. Pool B's top seed will be the winner of the Southwest (McAllister Park American of San Antonio, Tex.) vs. West (Park View LL of Chula Vista, Calif.) game on Tuesday night.

Georgia is now Pool A's top seed and would play the Texas-California loser on Thursday. The two winner's Wednesday and Thursday will play in Saturday's United States Championship, with the winner of that facing the International winner for the Little League World Series title on Sunday.

But Zaccariello isn't looking that far ahead just yet.

"(Iowa) has their ace on the hill, back on short rest," he said. "It should be a good game to watch."
The manager decided that Mike Rapaglia will get the call to start Monday's game, even though ace lefty Angelo Navetta is eligible to pitch. Zaccariello liked what he saw from Rapaglia in limited action against Georgia, and sees no reason to bring Navetta back on less than his usual rest.

"Pags (Rapaglia) looked very good (in 20 pitches against Georgia)," he said. "From what we saw, he was getting the gun up there around 65-66 (miles per hour). And he had good location on all of his pitches. I'm very happy with what I saw there. If he throws like that, we should have a great chance to win the game."

Zaccariello attended Sunday's Midwest-Northwest game to scout and "let the team sleep late" then, after practice, he set the team free to have dinner with their parents. He said he wanted everyone back by 8 p.m. for what he called jokingly referred to as "lockdown."

As for the injury status of second baseman Joe Ruggirello (knee bruise) and shortstop Anthony Scotti (hamstring strain), it looks like Ruggirello will definitely play, but Scotti was still sore and would again be a "game-time decision" according to Zaccariello.

While the manager is certainly aware of the fact that South Shore National's wild summer ride could very well end Monday night, he doesn't even want his team thinking that way heading into the game.

"No, no, no. We want to come out and play well and keep playing for as long as we can," Zaccariello said. "We have so many people in Staten Island counting on us and supporting us. We want to win for them."